A typical home’s air conditioning ventilation duct has dozens of tunnels running throughout your home. They carry heated or cooled air throughout your home’s air duct system, keeping your home comfortable for years and years. The air duct system can collect dirt, fungus, pet hair, dust, and mold. Mildew can grow inside these tunnels—even rodents and birds can nest and even defecate inside your air duct system.
According to the National Air Duct Cleaners Association, it is recommended to clean your home’s air duct system every couple of years, and it should be cleaned at least once after it’s construction. This is mainly because during the original construction of your home, there is drywall, sawdust, and even nails that were left over from the construction that can get into your air ducts and over a period of years dirt and dust can collect around them.
People have the mistaken notion that when they move into a new house that it has been cleaned, when in reality they may clean your carpeting, your windows, and your walls, but the dirtiest part of your home is most likely the air ducts. The air ducts is the part that gets neglected. Unless you have specifically requested that your air ducts get cleaned, then chances are they are dirty.
At the very least, your air duct system should be cleaned once and afterwards further cleanings are based upon your personal preference and your needs. Continual cleaning of your air ducts depend on a number of factors such as whether or not you have pets in the home, if you smoke in the home, if you live in a dusty or dirty place, or if there are members of your family with allergies. These are factors that can increase the need for a more frequent cleaning of the air duct system in your home. On average, people clean their air ducts every three to five years. Cleaning your air ducts also improves the air quality of your home, and can help increase the efficiency and life of your air conditioning unit.
